Unless it goes against your RPing, why not join both? They both suit similar builds.

I don't hate lockpicking, I actually wish that tree were useful. If you had to put perks into lockpicking to open every chest then I would do so, as I am a player who likes to have access to everything. Since you can buy a ton of lockpicks for nothing though, and since even a level 1 character can pick a master locks with a decent amount of picks, the whole tree is useless.

or you play on PC where you can't use pressure sensitivity with your keyboard.

I play on PC and you can still often "feel" it. You have to press and then release quickly, and this avoids the breaking point most of the time.

On Master, on PC, in 30+ levels I did so far, I only had problem with 1 lock, where I wasted around 20 lockpicks before opening it. Not a huge problem considering I accumulated over 100 lockpicks by then.

I play on PC. I think it's actually easier with the mouse than the anolog sticks, as you can more easily make small movements.

Lockpicking comes in handy actually. You can find more gold in chests if you raise the perks, not that much into finding gold in chests though, but if you get curious about some random door/chest that may reward useful items then this is a good perk to have.

Anyone can lockpick any lock with little-to-no effort up until Expert. Expert breaks picks a lot, but have you tried Master locks? Those things are a pain. The sweet spot for master locks are so tiny that I usually break 20 picks before I find where it is that'll make the lock turn. So, if you raise the perks for each type of lock then you only have to use half the effort. I've found many things in chests that are helpful as well as also finding new areas due to having the lockpick perks.

BUT if you REALLY want to level up your pickpocket perks raise sneak and lockpicking for a bit and break into homes and pickpocket NPCs in their sleep >:D that's what I did from lv 26 to lv 27 (A heartwarming thank you goes to the Black-Briar family).

Exactly. Pickpocketing is awesome. Lockpicking can be done without a single perk, but that 50% chance to receive a rare item sounds half decent.

Go with pickpocketing. I have about 80 skill in lockpicking with no perks. Sure I break a fair few lockpicks but I can open any chest and it just isn't worth the perk points overall, especially with how easy it is to find lockpicks and buy them.

Pick pocket all the way. It's incredibly easy to level once you are lvl 40. Get 3 perks into the Bonus Pickpocket and you'll have a 90% chance on damn near everything even when someone is watching you (until lvl 40, u gotta hide from sight and can be a pain). I also get the Poison and Carry Weight perk to mess around with killing ppl with poison in their pockets and +100 weight is awesome! I don't really go all the way to being able to take their wielded weapons & armor though, as theres so many other perks i need lol.

As for lockpocking, yeah its pretty useless but the 50% more treasure perk is pretty good if you are working on the 100k trophy, just costs 5 perks to get.

well I hate it.. I like it with a controller but my dang controller messes up with games for some reason lately. It forces the camera to constantly look straight at the ground.. :\

Pick pocket.

You don't need to wait for Daedric drops, Daedric bows are easy enough to make if you
Though without the smith perk, you won't be able to upgrade it as much, it will still be an awsome bow, without the perk sink.

As for PP or LP, I'm trying to squeze some perks into both, mostly for RP reasons though.
With LP% enchants and Potions you don't need LP perks to use LP effectively, but then the same is for PP, its just that the PP perks are cooler.

The Kahhjit caravan that travels sells one hundered or so lockpicks. Buy as many lockpicks as you can until you have about 200. Skill won't matter after that.

No no no. 5 perks is a huge amount of perks, it's not "just 5 perks". 5 perks is 10% if you play till level 50, which is above average playing time for one character.

Even if it was only 1 perk, Treasure Hunting would not be worthwhile.


I don't think you quite understood previous posts. The main limitation to your profits, getting to 100k, is *not* dungeon loot which is overall crap. The main limitation is the amount of gold a merchant has. You can loot 500k worth of items in a dungeon, but it doesn't mean anything if you can only sell up to 700 at a time to a single merchant. Unless you do a lot of Waiting and do nothing but jump from city to city, any money-gaining perks are useless. With Alchemy for example you can "earn" around 1400 gold each time you visit a city (once per day) by selling items in General store and Alchemy store. Not only that, but you can buy whatever you want in these stores, increase merchant gold pool, and sell a bunch of potions until merchants gold hits zero (probably works with other crafted items too but I don't use smithing or enchanting).


There is no reason whatsoever to invest a single perk in Lockpicking. Even people who like lockpicking minigame should not invest here because these perks eliminate the minigame itself. If I go lockpicking just for fun, breaking few lockpicks is not a bad thing.

Neither. You'll pick enough locks in the game to level that easily, and I'm an assassin/thief/bow user, but don't pick anyone's pocket. For me, the payback vs. the time used sneaking around etc., isn't worth it.

I also use a 2H sword as "last stand" defense and don't use perks there, it levels itself.

I prefer to use perks on more important things like archery.

Regarding the bow, I check every bow I see/pickup and if it puts out more damage, I switch. Same for arrows. As you get deeper into the game, you find different arrows like Nord arrows, Elf arrows, etc., that do more damage.

What I do recommend is enchanting. I have an enchant on my bow that does 21 points damage. The bow also is leveling up with me, something I didn't see early in the game. Initially it did 35 points damage, but now is up to 49, plus the enchant. Guess this must be the points I put into archery. Oh, use any poison you find for the harder fights, i.e., against mini-bosses.

One other thing, don't power level enchanting, smithing, alchemy, or any other non-combat skills. Because your character will increase in levels, but your combat capability does not increase. However, the enemy NPCS/Animals also increase in level with you, and their combat capability will increase. Thus, you'll be fighting much tougher foes.

When you start enchanting/disenchanting stuff, that will increase your level, so I don't put perks there either.

Good luck.

Haven't tried it yet, but been told if you take a companion you can comand (Lydia), you can tell them to unlock doors and chests, and they do immediately regardless of the difficulty of the lock.

After unlocking a few Lockpicking perks I find significantly better loot, and a lot more money in locked chests.

I didn't know that perk "easier to pick a lock" means "significantly better loot in a chest".

Are you sure you didn't just level in the meantime which means increased loot.



And considering money isn't an issue in the game I still think it's pointless to pick money-making perks. It's better to choose roleplaying perks instead (unless you pick lockpicking because of RP).